Productivity Knowledge Base: Case Histories

Case #0003:
Productivity enhancement can undermine productivity.

Barbara
was a department manager in a company we'll call ACME. In
Barbara's department, things had pretty much evolved to the way the
workers liked them. There were some inefficiencies, but overall the
department ran smoothly.

ACME's CEO, based
in the Midwest (USA), attended a conference in Hawaii in the winter.
While there, he sat in an a seminar from an efficiency expert. The spiel
sounded good, so the CEO later contacted this expert about making
improvements at ACME.

This efficiency expert
visited ACME, and later submitted a massive report. This report
contained all kinds of charts and graphs, plus it had extensive
explanatory text. This impressed the CEO, who then flipped to the
recommendations area. Some of these were very good. Others were simply
"best practices" force-fit where they didn't belong. But, all
of these sounded good to the CEO, who then ordered these implemented
company-wide.

Let's review a few of these,
and see what happened.

Expert's
observation

Expert's
recommendation

Actual result

Employees spend too much
time watching the hour glasses on their outdated computers.

Have an IT group update
the computers to the proper configurations.

Employees became
significantly more productive at their computers.

Too much paper being
filed, too much time wasted chasing down paper files.

Reduce the number of
filing cabinets by 50%, forcing employees to use electronic filing
methods.

Papers stacked on desks
and floors. What should have been done: move one small group at
at time to 100% electronic methods.

Invoice process had 16
unnecessary steps.

Reconfigure invoicing to
"the right way," as defined by the consultant.

Employees totally lost
with new system. Invoices sent late. What
should have been done: Involve employees in streamlining process,
going at their pace.

Employees spend too much time at the coffee pot.

Remove the coffee pots from each of the four floors and
put them in the cafeteria only.

Employees spent more time
walking to cafeteria, and more time at coffee pot once there.

No discernable effect. What
should have been done: Train employees on electronic methods and
supply the tools to use them.

Salaried employees weren't
always putting in a full 8 hours at the office.

Install a time clock, and
require employees to work specific hours.

Between non-compliance,
resignations, time spent fighting this instead of working, and other
fallout, this idea was a loser. What should have been done: Don't
measure how many hours people work. Give them clear and achievable
goals. Flex-time is a valuable tool for motivating people. Let
supervisors supervise--
don't hold them to artificial measurements.

Work methods, office
furniture, and other items were non-standard. Because there were
differences, some employees must necessarily be working at less capacity
than others.

Standardize office
furniture and issue work procedures.

Office furniture became an
impediment to some people. The work procedures created friction. What
should have been done: Ask people what they needed to change in
their office furniture, but don't standardize. Keep procedures flexible,
and have those doing the work actually write them (with assistance from
a coordinator)--this lets them think about the best way to do their
jobs.

Can you see the pattern, here?
Productivity improvement is not a cut and paste operation. It is,
instead, an intelligent process. It takes intelligent analysis, and it
requires working closely with people. An "expert" cannot give
you a magic pill.

Blindly implementing productivity enhancements can
have very negative effects, no matter how good a particular idea sounds
at first. Our seminars help you understand how to evaluate ideas and implement them for best
results.

Do you want to radically improve how well people in your organization make
use of the limited number of hours in each work day?

Contact me to arrange a
time when we can talk about a presentation:
mark@mindconnection.com. Why
arrange a time? So I can give you full attention during the call. There's a
really powerful time management tip. Ask me why it works.